Richmond Hill restaurant finds inspiration from Singaporean hawker markets

Ismaila: You said that Highway 7 is one of your favourite roads for food. Why is that? 

Suresh: This is a busy arterial road that borders Richmond Hill, North York and Markham. It's an exciting street to eat through because of the range of East Asian and Southeast Asian restaurants here. You want great Sichuanese food? You go to Highway 7. 

If you want to experience great Cantonese dim sum, this is where I'm going to take you. We're talking literally hundreds of places to eat, places that are catering to specific palates with regional menus. 

Like today's restaurant. One of my personal favourites, White Orchid. 

Ismaila: Tell me about it.

Suresh: White Orchid is a small family-owned restaurant. It sits in one of the many plazas on Highway 7, kind of closer to Bayview. 

I visited a number of years back, but received a proper introduction by Toronto chef Jackie Lin. It's run by a couple, Patrick Chuang and Irene Ng. Patrick does the cooking and he's got a pretty interesting story. 

He was born in Fujian, in the southern province of China. He got into cooking because he says he was trying to be like his mom, who he says was an excellent cook. He comes to Canada for university, but actually ends up in Singapore to work with his dad. And that's where he gets romanced by hawker markets. 

Ismaila: Tell me more about these markets. What are they like? 

Suresh: Singapore is an incredible food city. You have a variety of cultures and styles of cuisine that have kind of permeated into Lion City over many, many years. 

It's an exciting place not just for, like, the medium and high-tiered extravagant restaurants, but for street food. Hawkers and street food vendors over the years were relocated by the government into these outdoor markets, and the hawker markets are really the percussion of food culture in Singapore. 

Patrick was romanced by the idea of these vendors that would curate small menus and they would have these specialized dishes. He started studying them. He would tell me that he would sit there at the bench and then watch them closely to learn some of his favourite dishes, like the Hainanese chicken rice, for example. 

Ismaila: What's that like? 

Suresh: This is a simple looking dish, but one that requires quite a bit of technique. 

You take a whole bird — skin on, which is very important — and you salt it and you let it sit for a little bit. Then you bring it to a boil in a pot of water with some aromatics like ginger and scallions, for example.

Simmer, you flip the chicken, you simmer some more, then you pull out the bird and you let it cool. And now you toast some rice and you cook that rice in the same stock. And then you serve this together. 

You have this mound of glistening rice with a slice of bone and chicken served on top. Then accompanying it, you have soy sauce, you have some chili garlic sauce and you have ginger and scallion oil. 

Ismaila: Okay, so that's what you see. What does it taste like? 

Suresh: It is really sublime. That would be a great way to describe it. Very delicate and very subtle in flavour. 

This chicken is impossibly tender with this silky yellow skin on top that has a gelée-like quality to it. 

And this rice is really aromatic with the essence of the chicken stock that kind of comes through with each bite. Then, you have the three accoutrements that kind of bring the umami and the acidity in the spice. You get the hot sauce, add ginger and scallion oil, so you can tailor each spoonful to your liking. 

But it is a very delicate experience, and Patrick has spent over 25 years working on this dish. 

Ismaila: So what are some other must try dishes at White Orchid? 

I would say that my second favourite category are the roti and curry dishes. Malay and Singaporean-style curry, which is kind of emblematic of taking the spice notes of Indian curry and bringing in the umami and the vibrancy of Southeast Asia. So like lemongrass and star anise, or like fish sauce and Kecap Manis, which is a sweet soy sauce. 

You have this fiery,yellow, orange curry with chunks of meat or vegetable. There's always potatoes in there. It's always served with roti prata, which is a flat bread that's repeatedly kneaded with ghee. 

It's really lacy and it's got these sort of thin flakes. You would tear off a piece of the roti and dip it in the curry, and it is just perfection. 

Aside from that, there's also this "secret menu" that Patrick has published on the website. It's in Cantonese. It's not in English. 

Ismaila: So how do you navigate that?

Suresh: I mean, there are translation apps now.  Or you talk to Patrick. 

I mean, it's "secret" because these are very personal dishes to him. They represent his Fujian heritage. So you'll find all sorts of fried fish and clam dishes. 

There is a pork bone soup called a bak kut teh, which is outstanding. 

Then, there are these really elaborate presentations of seafood. So think like a whole crab or whole lobster cooked with glass noodles and vegetables and fungus. 

Ismaila: White Orchid is celebrating 10 years now. How have they been coping through the pandemic? 

Suresh: Patrick is 65 years old. He's been cooking for over 30 years.

Despite the pandemic, White Orchid has done fine mostly because they have a pretty unique menu and the audience has not let up in the last 18 months or so. 

I think what worries me is Patrick will jokingly tell me that he's going to retire in five years and close the restaurant, which kind of breaks my heart a little bit.

But he's been working on his compendium of recipes — a cookbook, if you will —for the past 20 years and he wants to finish it.

Honestly, this is ultimately the reality check that we're going to get as a food city in the next 10 years when our culinary fathers and mothers finish writing their chapter. 

So my advice to you is savour every spoonful of that chicken rice and every tear of that roti dipped in curry while these places are around.